Tag Archives: summer

In a little under 6 hours we made it to our first destination, visiting my grandparents in Eastern Washington. Hopefully we will be off to Montana tomorrow! We also found my favorite snack mix at a local grocery store (amazon.com no longer sells it) and I bought the entire stock (5 packages). I was so excited because now I don’t have to pay a ridiculous amount for shipping!

I went to Bite of Seattle today with my mom. I haven’t been there in several years, but today was sunny and I had lots of fun. There were performances on stage:

Initially we looked around…

Then we headed over to the Alley and the wine tasting. The Alley is a $10 donation to food lifeline (per plate) that gets you food from 7 restaurants. We also shared in one wine tasting for the $12 happy hour price, which included 5 tastings and a commemorative glass.

More to come (ran out of time) on the non-food side of things, and more on the seeing-Seattle side of things!

We also enjoyed some free samples (of many random things like sweeteners, etc.) There was also a free So Delicious brand fudgesicle-type dessert made from coconut milk and free applesauce and peanut butter. We also tried Amy’s organic rice macaroni and cheese, and some Santa Cruz organic lemonade.

I will leave you with PUNK ROCK AEROBICS. Something that reminds me of Seattle.

On Thursday I made blackberry bars. I didn’t think anything could really beat raspberry bars, but in an attempt to do so I cooked up some blackberry jam and then made the blackberry bars. I followed the same recipe for raspberry jam and raspberry bars and I think they turned out super well!

As you can see, we’ve already been enjoying them. I predict they will be gone before Sunday. (Even if I do eat them myself.) So, in the end, I would definitely recommend doing these with blackberries as well. 🙂

UPDATE: Over half of them are gone. I predict we will finish them by Friday.

Step 1. Chop up pecans ahead of time. Make them pretty small like below. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Step 2. Combine pecans, sugar and flour in a large mixing bowl.

Step. 3 Melt butter and add to mixture with egg.

Step. 4 Mix all ingredients together till it forms a crumbly, but moist dough that sticks together.

Step 5. Press mixture to bottom of greased baking dish. A casserole dish works great for this. Set aside 1.5 cups of the mixture to crumble on top.

Step 6. Add jam and spread to edges. Leave about 1/3 inch on the sides, the jam will spread to it.

Step. 7 Crumble 1/2 cup on top cover all jam and the sides.

Step 8. Bake for 40 minutes at 350 degrees or until crumbs are golden brown. Check around 30 minutes to make sure it isn’t burning. After it’s done take out and let it sit for 3 hours and then cut in pan and enjoy.

Hello all, Melissa is back home do some job training so I felt I should throw up a post that is quick and easy.

As we all know I love BBQing and my favorite food to grill is ribs.

Ingredients:

1 lb. pork spare ribs

1/4 cup marinade of choice

4 tablespoons spices (we did half pepper, half cumin)

A little olive oil

A little lemon juice

Step 1. Get yourself some delicious ribs, pork is usually cheaper.

Step 2. Assemble you seasonings. Feel free to mix and match. Marinade the ribs for at least 2 hours before putting them on the grill.

Step 3. Use a fork to put holes in the meet so your seasonings and marinade can soak in.

Step 4. After 2 hours put ribs on the grill on medium high heat. I put the meat face up first so I can add some more marinade and sauce, but a lot of people like to cook the top layer of meat first.

Step 5. After a good 5 to 8 minutes on medium high heat flip the ribs to starting cooking that delicious meat.You want to create a char on the meat to give it a nice crispy, fall off the bone taste. Be sure not to blacken the whole slab though. Keep cooking the meat for 10 minutes, checking every 4 to 5 minutes.

Step 6. Flip the ribs over after you have desired char and turn down to low heat and cook for another 5 to 10 minutes depending on your ribs. When the meat starts to slightly crack, it is nicely cooked. See the wonderful char marks? They will just add taste to the greatness that is these ribs.

Step 7. Prepare sides with the ribs. The ribs need to rest for a little bit, so this is a good time to make a salad and warm up some bread. After the sides are done cut the ribs up and serve.

As a fairly-new seasonal berry-picker I may not have the most advice to offer (though I’ve been picking blackberries since I was quite young) but Colin has been doing so for longer than I.

We went to Boxx Berry Farm (my favorite place to pick berries) to pick raspberries, my #2 berry preference, just behind blueberries. Raspberries are the easiest to pick, in my opinion, requiring little reaching or bending down/hunching over to yield the best results. They’re also super cheap; they’re a much better deal than buying berries at the store.

Berry Picking Tips:

Wear clothes you don’t care about; they may get stained or dirty

Call ahead to see if there are enough berries/make sure they’re open

Compare the cost of gas for driving to picking location to in store prices from same farm

Go when it won’t be busy (on overcast days), even though sunny days can be more fun

Pick berries as close to stem as possible, discard attached stems

Give stems a twist if they aren’t snapping off

Some farms have a minimum-pick-limit; be sure you can pay for the amount you pick